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Bastille Day

National Holiday in France

When is Bastille Day?

Bastille Day is celebrated on 14 July and marks the birth of the French Republic. It is the National Day of France

If 14 July falls on a Sunday, the following Monday is a holiday in lieu. If 14 July is a Thursday, it is common for many people to take the Friday off to create a 'pont' (bridge ) to the weekend.

In France, it is referred to as la Fête Nationale ("National Holiday"),

Technically the holiday marks the Fête de la Fédération of the 14 July 1790, which was a huge feast and event to celebrate the establishment of a constitutional monarchy in France.

History of Bastille Day

However the holiday is usually seen as a celebration of the storming of the Bastille.

After years of Monarchy rule, the French people had finally united in a popular uprising in an effort to take control of their own country.

On 14 July 1789 the people of Paris banded together to march on the Bastille. The Bastille was a state prison that represented the absolute despotism of the regime of Louis the 16th.

The storming of the prison marked the beginning of the French Revolution and came to symbolize liberty, democracy and the struggle against oppression for all the people of France.

On the one-year anniversary of the fall of Bastille, 14 July 1790, delegates from across the country assembled in Paris to proclaim their allegiance as one national community at the Fête de la Fédération.

Bastille Day was declared a French national holiday on 6 July 1880.

Did you know?

One of the lunatics was an Anglo-Irish man named De Witt (or Whyte) who variously believed that he was either Julius Caesar, St. Louis, or God

Over one hundred people died in the storming of the Bastille, but only seven prisoners were actually being held in the Bastille at the time. This included four forgers and two lunatics.

When the Bastille was demolished, a developer made a fortune selling off pieces as souvenirs

One freed prisoner is said to have refused to go until he had finished his roast pheasant dinner

The Bastille was originally a royal state prison built in the 1370s to defend Paris from the English during the Hundred Years War